President breaks ground for new hospital

BETHESDA, Md., July 3 (UPI) -- U.S. President Bush broke ground Thursday on a new hospital in Maryland that will combine services for all branches of the military.

The $970 million Walter Reed National Military Medical Center is scheduled to open in 2011, The Washington Post reported. The hospital is to combine the functions of the Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the National Naval Medical Center.

"At this new center, wounds will be healed, medical knowledge will be advanced, lives will be rebuilt," Bush said. "And those who wear our nation's uniform will be reminded that they have the enduring gratitude of the American people."

The hospital is to have 345 beds. Plans for the new hospital grew after the original proposal, partly because of the influx of wounded veterans from Afghanistan and Iraq and because of the scandal about poor conditions in some areas at Walter Reed.